Once is never (1955)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Once is never |
| Country of production | GDR |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1955 |
| length | 98 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 0 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Konrad Wolf |
| script | Paul Wiens |
| production | DEFA |
| music | Günter Kochan |
| camera | Werner Bergmann |
| cut | Friedel Welsandt |
| occupation | |
| |
Once is never is a German musical comedy by Konrad Wolf from 1955 . The film is one of the few homeland films that DEFA produced.
action
Composer Peter Weselin comes from Düsseldorf to the Saxon town of Klingenthal , where he wants to go on vacation with his uncle Edeltanne. After years of boogie accompaniment at the piano, Peter finally needs some rest from the light music and is even haunted by boogie music in nightmares during the train ride. He falls from the moving train, still drunk with sleep, falls into a bale of hay and sends a car driver away who would take him to Berlin. Shortly asleep, he is discovered by the girls from Klingenthal, Anna and Elvira, and kissed cockily. Peter loses track of the two young women.
Klingenthal proves to be a musical place: The Klingenthal Music Days are imminent and Peter soon has various commissioned works to compose. Uncle Edeltanne wants a piece for his traditional house music association Äolsharfe, the Harmonikawerk asks him for a classical composition for the company's own symphony orchestra and the dance band that has just been founded absolutely needs a hit with which it can perform at the music days. The fact that Peter strictly refuses to write a hit is particularly outrageous to Anna, who is the singer in the band and also appears as a classical singer in the orchestra. She now refuses to sing Peter's new composition, especially since, due to various coincidences, she must get the impression that Peter is chasing her. Edeltanne also believes that Peter is having an affair and sends his nephew home.
However, Peter finds accommodation with the music-loving Erwin, who happens to live next door to Anna. She believes that Peter has actually left, but Erwin arranges a meeting for the two of them and they finally admit their love. In the meantime, Peter has secretly composed a hit for the dance band, which he played to Anna for the first time the day before the music days. She is enthusiastic. She is less pleased when he shows her his rhapsody for the symphony orchestra. He wrote it only for his great love - but above the sheet of music is the name "Marie Alvert", a well-known accordion player, for whom a solo is provided in the piece. Although Peter can convince Anna that he has never met Marie and that he has never written the name on the sheet of music, Marie turns out to be the woman Peter wanted to take with him to Berlin shortly after his rough arrival in the hay bale . When she told Anna about a funny encounter in the hay, Anna misunderstood the situation and left Peter the day before the music days.
On the day of the performance, both Anna and Marie are missing and Peter sees the performance of his rhapsody fail. Suddenly both women, who have used the intervening time for pronunciation, appear on stage and the play becomes a great success. Anna returns to the meadow where she first saw Peter. Peter runs after her and they both kiss.
production
Once is never is one of the few home films that DEFA has produced. The shooting team found forests and mountains in 1954 in Klingenthal and the surrounding area in the Vogtland , Ore Mountains , where large parts of the film were made. Another location was Leutenberg in Thuringia. The Babelsberg studio served as the studio . The film structures were created by Alfred Tolle and Hans-Jörg Mirr , the production management was in the hands of Alexander Lösche .
The working title of the film was This is how it sounds in Klingenthal . Once is never had its premiere on March 25, 1955 in the Babylon cinema in Berlin and in the DEFA film theater Kastanienallee.
The film music was written by Günter Kochan , who was only 25 years old at the time. Once is never was director Konrad Wolf's film debut. The film is considered Wolf's homage to the Soviet musical director Grigori Alexandrow , with whom Wolf had studied at the WGIK .
Reviews
The contemporary criticism of the GDR accused the film of remaining superficial and of making no social statement: “The film is not a bit like an editorial,” wrote the Weltbühne , and other critics demanded “that every work of art expresses a real human, ie social experience [en] ”, but the film doesn't.
For the lexicon of international films , once was by no means a "moderately entertaining comedy with a propagandistic undertone."
literature
- F.-B. Habel : The great lexicon of DEFA feature films . Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-89602-349-7 , pp. 134-135 .
Web links
- One for the Money in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Once is never at filmportal.de
- Once is never at the DEFA Foundation
Individual evidence
- ↑ See progress-film.de
- ^ Alfred Bauer: German feature film Almanach. Volume 2: 1946-1955 , pp. 499 f.
- ^ Ralf Schenk (Red.), Filmmuseum Potsdam (Hrsg.): The second life of the film city Babelsberg. DEFA feature films 1946–1992 . Henschel, Berlin 1994, p. 115.
- ^ Carl Andrießen: The Difficult Joy . In: Die Weltbühne , No. 13, 1955, p. 399ff.
- ↑ Wolfgang Teichmann: It's about the culture of feeling . In: Deutsche Filmkunst , No. 5, 1955, p. 225ff.
- ↑ Once is never. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed October 16, 2016 .